However, a fascinating article
from the Economist points out that hidden beneath these
attention-grabbing problems, it looks like the very economic core
of Serbia could well be rotten.

Unemployment last November hit 23.7%, while the much-touted
privatization of a major steel factory failed and the plant had
to be "re-nationalized".

Ivana Prica, an economist at Belgrade University,
tells the Economist that another problem is a high trade
deficit that is leading to huge amounts of foreign debt — a path
familiar to the Greeks.

The result seems to be a political swing to the nationalist
right,
a familiar sight for much of Europe. An offshoot of an
extremist party, the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS), seems to
have around 30% of the vote in an upcoming election.

The problem is, of course, that Serbia sits in the middle of a
geopolitical and recent historical context that means this swing
to the right could have far more consequence.